


Gathering Moss

by tainry



Category: Transformers (Bay Movies), Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: AU, Fluff, Humor, Multi, Self-Insert, Slice of Life
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-12
Updated: 2020-07-12
Packaged: 2021-03-04 18:13:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,693
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25230685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tainry/pseuds/tainry
Summary: Some friends and I go to Yosemite, where we expect fantastic scenery, wildlife, hiking, and pristine night skies. We do not expect a robot.
Relationships: Beachcomber/Perceptor (Transformers)
Comments: 17
Kudos: 43





	Gathering Moss

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [101 Ways To ACTUALLY Die While Working On Your PhD](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10165517) by [MlleMusketeer](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MlleMusketeer/pseuds/MlleMusketeer). 



> A couple three years ago, Mlle started her hilarious fic, _101 Ways To ACTUALLY Die While Working On Your PhD_. The usual trolling against self-inserts and the Dreaded Mary Sue was going on again, but this time there was some positive response - let people write for fun, damn your eyes! Inspired by her, I started this bit of silliness, but hadn't dug in to get anything into a postable form until now. Late to the party again! XD
> 
> Rating and tags just in case - I don't expect overt shagging in this one...

It wasn’t really like in most stories about aliens arriving on Earth. They were here by accident. As much as their AllSpark landing here was accident, and apparently the jury was out on that one. And if they’d come a hundred years ago it’s possible no-one would have noticed. They’d have taken their artifact – whichever side got to it first – and taken their war back out into space, maybe even back to their ravaged homeworld. 

Too late for any of that now. 

They came and we found out. They stayed, and that broadcast in 2009 spilled all the beans. Everything was different. Mostly it was the same.

I’d finally wrangled a full week’s vacation out of the new bosses – a not inconsiderable feat, as said bosses seemed to regard any of the staff taking time off as literally stealing food from their children’s very mouths. Jubilantly, my longtime friends and vacation-buddies, L and S, and I headed to Yosemite for the duration. 

L’s family had a timeshare in a posh location – bought decades ago when location was not posh – so accommodations were taken care of. The three of us had been here a few years ago, but split our time between Yosemite and Lake Tahoe. This time we were staying put, to enjoy a more leisurely exploration of the park. Mostly hiking and loafing, to be honest. And hiking with us generally involves walking for an hour or so to find some nice place to sit and get some writing done on our laptops. (I was hoping to finally finish a multi-chapter _The Man from U.N.C.L.E._ fic that I’d started years before. Tying up a loose end, since I’d switched fandoms recently.) 

Our goal this particular afternoon, as it had been the last time we were here, was Sentinel Dome, to sit and write and enjoy the clear air and the sunset, and then trek back to the parking lot around dusk and stargaze for a bit before heading back to the timeshare. 

The trail to Sentinel Dome is pretty easy; not too steep and well marked in most places, though there is one stretch across bare granite where I, if alone, would probably have to wander around to find the next section, even obeying the common sense directive of _go up_. It winds around in the fragrant trees, then heaves to the summit. An oval mound of rock shouldering up from the surrounding Sierras, with one side carved away by glaciers like the rest of the valley. Not as big nor as high as Half Dome, and much less well-known, even though the view is wondrous. 

The three of us each found our niche; L near the westward edge, where the rock sloped toward the precipitous drop, S with her back against a low ridge of stone, me near the trunk of a Jeffrey pine old as Shakespeare, that had been weathering up there since dying in 1977 and falling in 2003. We could see, and faintly hear, at least three waterfalls, and there was Half Dome to the north, with the mountains to the east and the valley spread out south and west. We had plenty of water, and snacks in our backpacks. Cool granite under our backsides, cool breeze, warm sunshine. 

A few small groups of hikers came, snapped a few photos and went, and we got the inevitable question from most of them, “Are you getting internet up here?” No. We were not. We were writing, and one does not _need_ internet for that, most of the time. A more serious photographer with a tripod and big lenses joined us for a while, chatting with L (who is a tall Nordic blonde, whom S and I tend to shamelessly hide behind when other humans approach.) As the afternoon waned, and the wispy mare’s tail clouds turned golden, and the granite was gilded around us, we got mansplained to about leaving before the sun set because it was dangerous to try to get down in the dark. Which we ignored. (L has very good night vision. Mine is terrible, but I had remembered my trekking poles this time and L was wearing a light-colored sweatshirt, which I could see by starlight if all else failed, and S is staunch and sure-footed. Not to mention we’d done this before. And we had flashlights. We probably wouldn’t _use_ them, but we had them.) 

We had the dome to ourselves after that, writing until sunset, then putting our laptops away and watching the alpenglow grow vivid then fade on the surrounding mountains. We packed up reluctantly, eyes on the dark aquamarine sky unfolding over us from the east. The Blue Hour.

L heard it first, being closer to the western edge. The one with the long drop. A faint scratch and scrape, echoing oddly. I might not have noticed it if the other two hadn’t leaned out and looked _down_ so intently. I scooted closer, expecting not to be able to see whatever it was in the failing light.

Oh my.

We talked – a lot – about it later, and L, S and I each felt similar frissons of alarm, just for a second. Blue eyes meant good guys, or so the government ads said. Except some Decepticons knew we thought that and disguised themselves accordingly, the conspiracy websites warned. Most of the time, though, Decepticons considered humanity an irritant or target practice. And why would a Decepticon be climbing Sentinel Dome at dusk, when there were bigger, more populous and attention-getting sites nearby? (Also the optic color thing turned out to be way more complicated, which was cool to my zoology-major’s mind, but I didn’t know that yet.)

The blue eyes behind a translucent silver visor twinkled at us, and the robot raised a hand to wave.

“Hey there!”

“Hi!” we three said, close enough to unison to make us grin at each other. The robot scrambled up the last few dozen feet, taking the last slope at an easy lope as we backed away to give him (?) room. 

This wasn’t one of the bigger robots, although nine feet is pretty dang tall, standing next to. (Sixteen feet is taller than any human has ever been, and thirty feet is nigh incomprehensible until you’re standing next to someone’s enormous foot and not even reaching the top of his ankle.) 

The robot turned a circle, humming softly to itself (?), then whistled, smiling at us. “What a view!” 

Sunset was all but gone, but we agreed. “I was going to say you came up the hard way, but you made it look easy,” L said. None of us had seen any of the aliens in person before and I think we were a little breathless. The robot chuckled. 

“Mm, well, I’m a geologist,” he (…) said. “Kinda one with the stone sort of thing.”

“Gneiss,” I said. A rare occasion, as usually I’m the embodiment of l’esprit d’escalier. L and S groaned. I smirked. The robot laughed!

“I admit,” he said, “free-climbing does give me quite an apatite.”

“All that grabben,” I agreed. 

“It can be tuff,” he said, “but once you get used to it, it’s sedimentary.” This was impressive. He was actively punning, using scientific jargon, in not just a foreign language, but an entirely alien one. We knew the robots were all Super Geniusestm by human standards, but it was dizzying to be shown this in person. Also, boy was I glad I’d been a casual rock-hound since childhood!

“But sometimes you just have to vent about it, huh?”

“Metamorphically speaking, yeah.”

“Argh,” said L, enunciating the word clearly. 

“Oh, hey, name’s Beachcomber, nice to meet you all!” Like most of their names, this was an approximation, using human languages to try to express the core concepts of names that in their dialects are complex with eons of layered experiences and meaning. We introduced ourselves, and I thought of the meanings of our names, where I knew them, and how recent a history that was, in comparison. Still, we weren’t bleating random sounds at him – everyone’s name means something. (Mine means “good spear” or “powerful river” or “noisy” and is of Welsh derivation but used as a given name only since the 20th century. Dunno as I trust all the baby name books, but, eh…)

He smiled and nodded and symbols flickered over his visor too fast to catch. He, and we, turned to watch the moon rise over the dark valley, the waterfalls glimmering.

“Mooooon,” I crooned softly to myself, out of habit. There had always been some longing in this. Of course the Moon is a rock covered in craters and grey dust (fine as talcum powder and gets _everywhere_ , apparently), but it’s no less beautiful up there in the sky, pale gold rising to silver as it climbs, the full disc showing the Minoan Lady, ever-smiling, with her bright necklace and her two braids flying behind her. 

Eventually, S pulled a windbreaker out of her backpack and I contemplated doing the same. Beachcomber’s visor glittered at us again and he moved closer, drawing us in, warmth radiating from him as the wind picked up.

“Shale we head down?”

Oh. Yeah, it was full dark now. I dug my new headlamp out of my pack and put it on but didn’t light it. Trekking poles, check. Very useful for going down, especially with knees that might take exception to their treatment on short notice. L went first, as usual, then me, following her white sweatshirt. S behind me so that if I fell I’d only take out one other person. S is the shortest of us and therefore a more tempting target for mountain lions, so having her in back isn’t ideal, but Beachcomber took up the rear. I’m pretty sure no cougar in its right mind is going to take him on. 

It took me a while to notice that our immediate vicinity was brighter than the full moon could account for. (Concentrating on uneven terrain, here.) The robot had his alt-mode headlights on, though not brightly enough to wreck our night vision. A little warm glow was all, like a couple of candles. At a more or less level spot I glanced around and saw that his headlights were on his knees – so cute! – which also explained why that bit of extra light was kind of swinging back and forth. 

Back at the parking lot we leaned against L’s car – Beachcomber careful but successful, rocking the car with his weight only a little bit – looking up. Tuolumne Meadows’ night sky (not where we were exactly, but close enough) is Dark Sky rated at near pristine, though there’s a teeny bit of pollution from the San Juaquin valley. Much better than Sac county, though! I am always amazed when I can see the Milky Way, it happens so rarely.

“Can we see Cybertron from here?” S asked. 

I knew that one, but, I mean, jeez, let the actual Cybertronian answer, hm?

“Nope,” Beachcomber said. “Wrong hemisphere. And we, uh, we don’t have a sun.”

“You mean you don’t have a sun any more?” L asked. That was a good question. Were all planets formed around stars or did interstellar gas clump sufficiently to throw wanderers out randomly? The early Sol system had been an incredibly violent game of billiards, most other systems probably were too. Planets could get thrown out of orbit easily enough, so that seemed the usual method.

Beachcomber’s visor shimmered at her and he smiled. “Yeah. Need a star for planets. It’s totally a gravitational thing. Unless the Quintessons… I’m more into what the rocks are doing once the planets are already formed. We could ask Percy.”

“Perceptor?” I squeaked, balling my hands under my chin.

“Perceptor,” he said, chuckling. “Percy says natural planets need stars. Built planets are…different.”

“There are built planets,” L said, boggling. “Holy shit,” she and I said at the same time. (L and I have been besties for over 30 years. We do this a lot.)

“Yeah! Oh. Uh…” Beachcomber scratched the back of his head, as though he might not have been supposed to just tell people that. As far as I knew from the feeds, Perceptor had gotten in trouble a number of times for spilling various kinds of scientific beans to the primitives. It was great fun watching the scientific community lose its collective mind every other week. Bill Nye liked to flop on the ground, twitching, and Neil deGrasse Tyson did little dances – the opposite of what you’d expect, really.

We all giggled and looked up again, finding and naming constellations, (I only know Orion, to be honest,) making up new constellations – Wet Paper Bag, Spoon, Sword of Omens, Percy’s Face – and generally enjoying the company and the wonder of the universe. By about 3am we three humans were kind of cuddled up with Beachcomber to stay warm, and we only called a halt then because L still had to drive us back to our condo. Beachcomber gave us a gentle squeeze and let us go.

And that was it. We didn’t see him again for the rest of the week. We talked about him, though. About the alien robots in general. I may have talked too much, honestly. 

The year before, you see, had been the premiere of the BBC show _Lost Light._ Yeah, that one. Massive hit, even ignoring the completely CGI nature and therefore massive expense. Action figures, Halloween costumes, kitchen appliances, everything. I had t-shirts. (And underwear, which I never wore, but it was hilarious just to own it.) So. Okay. Highly fictionalized sci-fi show starring an all Cybertronian cast of misfits aboard the weird, possibly haunted ship, the _Errant Photon_. Captain Firewire, with his second and third in command, dour Maximus Amber and flighty Spectrum, respectively. Essentially a soap opera about giant robots. After the premiere, a certain subsection of the fanfic writing community had leapt to its feet as one, shouting, “OMG!!!!!!” You could hear the exclamation points echoing across the internet. 

I was one of them. Do I ship? Yes I do! I am a shippy shipper who ships. My favorites are the formerly undead Maelstrom (his panicky, pugnacious little boyfriend, Hatchback, I find a bit irritating, but I do think they’ve been very good for each other…), and the ship’s psychologist, Tier. (I also love the quick study, Backpedal, the grouchy medic, Spanner, and the embittered scientist, Focalshift. …Okay look, the writing is really fun [and quotable] and I like – in one way or another – the entire ensemble.) I hadn’t started writing fic until a few tragedies in, where I felt at last that there were holes in the narrative that I wanted to see filled. And there weren’t enough “girls.” Ain’t that just the way?

Anyway! I was hooked, but hadn’t been able to convince any of my IRL friends to get into the fandom. L seemed to regard it as one dubious step up from RPS and wouldn’t even watch it. My in-town friends thought the CG was sub-par (I disagree – it’s beautiful, but it _is_ stylized), and the writing either too soap-opera-y, or not soap-opera-y enough. Dad didn’t like it because the humor was too British. Mom is kind of a Mundane. My brother and sister-in-law live on a secondhand boat and don’t watch TV any more. Le sigh. 

Even before the show, though, I’d been into the aliens. Real aliens! From outer space! How awesome is that?! Okay, their battles with each other had done a lot – a LOT – of damage, and we humans in general had flipped our shizzle for a while, but things had calmed down. Mostly. Aliens! Eee! I am honestly glad and relieved not to be the only life in the universe, even if the other species we know about gives us a real run for our money in the “murderous” department.

Anyway. After Yosemite I started getting texts from Beachcomber. So did L and S, and I’m sure the Bots corresponded with gazillions of people. Um. Sooooo Beachcomber read my fic. All of it. 

Yup.


End file.
